According to reports, the Finance Minister, Fernando Haddad, is opposed to Caixa’s ‘Bet’. Three people involved in the discussions said that Lula has asked for the initiative to be suspended until he returns to Brasília after the COP30 UN climate-change conference.
Allies say, however, that the current trend is that the project will not move forward. Two government supporters added that there is no political climate for the measure to advance.
Lula has publicly stated that if the regulation of these bets does not yield beneficial results in preventing gambling addiction, the government may end the modality altogether.
Moreover, the President’s allies point out that it is contradictory for the bank to launch the ‘Bet’ at a time when the government is mounting a crackdown on the sector, with officials advocating tougher operating rules and the Presidential Palace strongly backing higher taxation of the segment.
The government aimed to raise taxation on gross revenue from ‘Bets’ from 12 % to 18 %, but the provisional measure containing this proposal and other revenue-raising initiatives was rejected by the Chamber of Deputies. The Executive has insisted on the rhetoric of demanding more taxes from betting houses but has not yet defined how the tax will be implemented.
The report reached out to the Secretaria de Comunicação Social of the Presidency and Caixa regarding the suspension of the state bank’s ‘Bet’ launch and its likely cancellation, but received no response.
However, insiders at the state bank say no final decision has been made. They are working to make the measure viable, citing the business’s potential and the high revenue possibility in this market.
They also note that the bank has already obtained a provisional concession from the Ministry of Finance to operate in Brazil’s online betting market. The state-owned bank, which obtained the authorization this year, paid R$ 30 million (US$5.5m) for the provisional licence and registered three trademarks at the ministry: Betcaixa, Megabet and Xbet Caixa.
The authorisations permit the bank to operate in sports betting, both physical and virtual, as well as other online gambling.
Source: Folha de S.Paulo
